


Held by the Grim Reaper

by yourgirlmickey



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Depression, Hurt/Comfort, I just really needed this, I love klance so much, I was having a depressive episode and this is how I cope, Lance hurts, Langst, M/M, Please Be careful, Self-Harm, Suicide, everything is gonna be okay, it's all okay though, keith is such a sweetheart, trigger warning
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-20
Updated: 2017-09-20
Packaged: 2018-12-31 20:37:57
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,433
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12140652
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/yourgirlmickey/pseuds/yourgirlmickey
Summary: Lance had been dealing with his depression for such a long time. Keith helps, but is it ever going to be enough?





	Held by the Grim Reaper

**Author's Note:**

> PLEASE BE CAREFUL AND DON'T KEEP GOING IF DEPRESSION, SUICIDAL THOUGHTS, AND SELF-HARM TRIGGERS YOU.
> 
> Thanks for coming and reading. <3
> 
> If this is well received I might add more to this story. Thanks!

“Suicide is a permanent end to a temporary problem.”  
Lance was 11 years old when he read that quote. He was surfing through Deviant Art (back when it was super popular) and came across a profile that specialized in “Legend of Zelda” fanart. He remembered thinking back then that it was such a true, thoughtful quote.  
Now, 8 years later, he remembered the quote as he etched patterns into his skin, enjoying the way it felt. The saying seemed more like a joke now. The kind of thing made up by people who don’t get it; who don’t understand. Maybe it wasn’t their fault that they didn’t understand… After all, it made sense. All problems can be fixed, right?   
Except… that wasn’t true. Not all problems could be fixed. But to people who had never faced such problems, it would sure seem that way.   
Lance hated himself because he couldn’t fix his problems. No one understood why, though. He was away from his abusive parents and he was going to therapy every couple of weeks, and yet… There he was, running his fingers over fresh cuts, smearing red all over his thighs. He couldn’t stop, even with the guilt weighing heavy on his chest, making him feel suffocated.   
He hated it. He hated himself. He hated his depression and his self-harming tendencies and his low self-worth and… everything.   
But most of all he hated the underlying root of the problem. No matter how much he hated the state of his mental health, he couldn’t get over or understand the fact that there was a small part of him that had fallen in love with it.   
Somehow, after all of those years of misery, he had become attached to the constant sadness and the ache it brought to his chest; to the need to feel pain- to inflict it; to the feeling that the world was better off without him.  
Most of all though, he loved the idea of death.  
As he let the razor blade hover above his wrists, he romanticized the idea of what the world would be like without Lance. He cursed as he finally flung the blade away, tears rolling down his cheeks.   
He was in love with death and that was probably most of the problem.

***

Keith kept the ringer volume up on his phone, just in case.   
It was rare for Lance to actually call him when he needed to, but that night Keith thanked Mothman that he had the volume up anyway.  
The clock on his night stand said that it was 1:03 am when his phone began vibrating and blasting “Hips Don’t Lie”. He jerked awake and stared at it, anxiety immediately making its home in the pit of his stomach.   
“Hello?” he answered. He slid out of bed and began feeling around for a pair of jeans on his bedroom floor.  
“Hey,” Lance replied, voice thick with tears, “I just, uh, really needed to hear your voice right now.”  
Keith felt like throwing up. “Lance, what’s wrong?” he asked, his hand frozen while gripping the waistband of his jeans.  
“What isn’t?” Lance answered, followed by sad laughter.   
“Lance…”  
“I just… You know, it’s like I can’t even say it,” he said, voice shaking. “I just had this… close call… and I just… God, Keith, I… I’m sorry,” he managed to say before he was full on sobbing.  
Keith quickly worked his pants on, his phone tucked between his ear and shoulder. “I’m coming, Lance. I’m coming, don’t worry.”

***

It was a five minute drive from Keith’s apartment to Lance’s, but somehow Keith made it in three minutes.  
He dug his keys out of his pocket and quickly shuffled through them until he came across the blue-and-white polka dotted key, which he proceeded to shimmy into the keyhole of Lance’s front door.  
The light in Lance’s humble little living room was off, but he could see light spilling into the bedroom from down the hall, likely from the adjoined bathroom.  
Keith all but ran into the bathroom and didn’t even hesitate when his eyes landed on Lance, trembling in the bathtub, face buried in his arms. He flinched when he noticed the traces of blood on the floor and edge of the bathtub.  
“Lance,” he whispered. “Baby…”   
He kneeled down next to his boyfriend, reaching for him slowly.   
The Cuban boy lifted his face to look at the boy beside him, eyes red and a pained expression eminent.   
“Keith,” he whispered, “I’m sorry…”   
“Shhh,” Keith hushed him gently, his hands taking hold of Lance’s underarms. “Come on, let’s clean up.”   
Lance had cut a little too deep this time (although, any cut at all was too deep by Keith’s standards) and Keith tried not to flinch when he saw the sea of slits on his boyfriend’s thighs.   
He pulled the first aid kit out from under the sink and began to sterilize the cuts with peroxide. If the clear liquid was burning Lance’s cuts, he didn’t react.   
“You know, let’s… do you wanna take a bath with me?” Keith asked, his hands settled on Lance’s knees.  
The other boy nodded without making eye contact.   
Keith filled the tub with hot water and began to strip when the tub was finally full. Lance shed his only article of clothing (his navy blue boxers) and climbed in first. Keith didn’t hesitate to follow him in.   
For a moment they sat on opposite ends of the tub, their knees touching. Silence stretched out between, making the air feel thick and heavy. There was so much Keith wanted to say, but all the words seemed to get lost on the way to his mouth because nothing came out.   
“Don’t you want to ask me why I did this?” Lance finally blurted out. He sounded hurt and confused, and it made his boyfriend’s heart ache.  
“Do you even know why?” Keith asked, his voice barely above a whisper.   
That’s when Lance broke. It started with silent tears and transformed into full fledge, red-faced sobbing. He flung himself across the tub and into Keith’s arms, hiding his face against the other boy’s neck.   
Keith held him, the way he always had. But this time was different somehow. Lance had never gone this far when hurting himself. He had never cut so deep before. Sure, Keith had come over countless nights in the past to find a broken Lance with some minor self inflicted injuries. But never had he heard Lance use the words “close call” as if he were afraid of them. As if he were afraid of himself.   
He wanted to move in with Lance or have Lance move in with him, but his boyfriend shot the idea down every time it was brought up saying that he wasn’t ready or it didn’t feel like the right time yet. And though Keith would usually spend the weekends with Lance, he didn’t have the time to stay over during the school week when he had classes and all of his stuff was at his house.   
Part of him felt guilty for leaving Lance alone so much, but his more rational side knew that he could only be with Lance as much as Lance allowed.   
Keith wanted to understand, but he couldn’t. And he had decided a long time ago not to pretend that he would ever fully grasp what Lance was going through, and he had told Lance that; he told him that he would do his best to try to understand everything that Lance explained to him but that he would rather focus on what Lance needed from him than why he needed it. Lance had smiled then and thanked him saying that that was really what he needed the most.   
But was it? Keith couldn’t understand why Lance continued to spiral down and wondered if maybe he wasn’t doing enough. He wondered if maybe he was supposed to do more or if he was supposed to do something different.   
Lance had told him that Keith couldn’t fix him. “It’s a chemical imbalance, Keith. It’s not your fault that you can’t fix the chemicals in my brain,” Lance had told him a couple of months ago.   
None of that eased Keith’s pain, though, and he cried silent tears as he held the boy he loved the most in the whole entire world, wondering why he couldn’t do anything to help him.

***

Keith put bandages on Lance’s thighs and then helped him get into some underwear. He put some on as well, and held his hand as they left the bathroom and wandered over to the bed. With Lance in his arms, Keith felt an unsteady sense of security. Right now, he could hold onto Lance and keep him from leaving. But he couldn’t always be there. What would happen the next day or a week later or a month later? Would Lance slip through his fingertips?  
The thought scared him to death; it terrified him. The thought of losing Lance.   
“Are you mad at me?” Lance asked, pulling Keith away from his nightmarish thoughts.   
“What? No, of course I’m not mad at you,” Keith answered, tightening his hold on the other boy.   
No one said anything for a moment, and then Lance asked another question. “Why do you stay with me?”  
Keith felt his stomach flip. Not because he didn’t know the answer but because Lance actually felt like he had to ask.   
“Because I love you,” Keith replied, feeling his heart overflow with thoughts of why and how much he loved Lance. “I love you more than anyone and anything in the entire universe.”  
“God,” Lance whispered, cupping Keith’s face in his hands, “I don’t deserve you at all. You’re… you’re the only thing keeping me from-”  
The way he stopped so abruptly was like a punch right in Keith’s gut. “From what?” he asked, his voice loud and clear but trembling. He sat up quickly, looking down at Lance with his hand clutching his chest. “What the hell is it you’re gonna do when I’m not here?” he cried, tears dripping down his cheeks.   
Lance stared up at him with wide eyes, because Keith had never let himself break down in front of Lance like that before. Never had Lance seen Keith so terrified.  
“I… Keith, I can’t,” Lance said, looking away. Sometimes it’s too hard to say words that you know are going to hurt more than anything, especially when they’ve never been said out loud.  
“Please,” Keith pleaded anyway, balling his hands up in the bed sheets. “Please tell me what’s happening, Lance. I don’t understand what’s going on or what’s going to happen to you and I don’t know if I can do anything, but I definitely can’t if you don’t-”  
“I wanna fucking kill myself!” Lance exclaimed, cutting Keith off. It was loud and his voice was hard; not from anger, but from the sheer hardship he had to go through just to get the words to come out of his mouth. It was like pushing through five brick walls at once, and it hurt. The words felt like venom on his tongue.   
Keith wished he was more surprised. He should be, really. But he already knew; he knew that somewhere deep down, he had been aware. That was why he was so terrified of losing Lance. He didn’t want to accept it, and he probably wouldn’t have accepted it if Lance hadn’t said it out loud.   
He was hurt because somewhere inside of himself, Keith felt like he wasn’t enough to make Lance want to live. But he was also aware of the fact that it had nothing to do with him. None of it was about him. This was a Lance problem and Lance had the final decisions to make when it came to saving himself. While Keith could do everything in his power to help, he couldn’t save Lance himself. He knew all of this, but it was still so painful.   
They sat staring at each other for a while, both of them looking scared and uncertain. Eventually, Keith broke the silence. “I know,” he whispered, reaching out and resting his hand on Lance’s cheek. “I know.”   
“Aren’t you, like, really pissed?” Lance asked, sitting up and scooching closer to Keith so that he could lean against Keith’s chest.  
“No, I’m not pissed, Lance. I’m just really scared,” Keith said, wrapping his arms around Lance tightly, wishing silently that they could just melt into one another right then and there.   
“What are you scared of?” Lance asked seriously. He knew- at least he thought he did -but he needed to hear it out loud.  
Keith buried his face in Lance’s hair. “I’m scared of losing you. I’m scared of you not being here with me anymore. I’m scared of knowing that I’m never going to love anyone ever again for the rest of my life because Lance, you’re it. You’re the only one I’m ever going to love. So I guess I’m also scared of going through my whole life alone and being that super grumpy, old man that yell at kids to get out of his yard when really I’m just miserable because the only person I could ever love and share my life with is gone and I can’t ever get him back,” he explained. His words were shaky and out of breath, but Lance didn’t mind.   
Lance sat up to look Keith in the eye as he continued. “And this might be cheesy as hell, but I’m really scared of dying, too… because the moment you’re gone, I’m going to die. I don’t think I’d ever be able to smile again,” he finished, his voice cracking as he choked back a sob.   
They looked at each other long and hard. The weight of all of his future actions weighed down on him.  
But then a question came to Lance’s mind, and maybe it changed everything.  
Who did he love more?  
Death or Keith?  
He knew the answer. He had been so blind. So blind and hurt and drowning in sorrow that he couldn’t see it until now.  
“Move in with me,” Lance whispered, staring into his eyes with the intensity of the sun.  
Keith looked shocked. “What?”  
“I want you to move in with me… I can’t push you away anymore… Things have to change.”  
They fell into each other’s arms, Keith crying the word “yes” and Lance’s heart aching because he knew that maybe things could actually be different someday.   
And maybe was all he really needed.


End file.
